Dec. 8—The cancellation of flights in and out of a foggy Louis Armstrong International Airport on Wednesday is being exacerbated by a piece of equipment that is offline while the airport expands one of its taxiways, an airport spokesperson said.

There had been about 42 cancellations and 20 delays as of about 10 a.m. as planes were unable to land on schedule, impacting departures scheduled for later in the day.

Airport spokesperson Erin Burns said the Instrument Landing System, a short-range radio navigation system that allows some planes to land in foggy conditions, will be offline and affecting one of the runways until taxiway G is completed early next year. The system guides the planes low enough so the pilots can land planes manually in the fog.

Some planes don't have the capability to use the system and some pilots aren't certified for it, so Burns said some of the affected flights would still have been delayed with the fog alone. But she said the outage is contributing to the rash of cancellations.

"Even if that was in place, we would still see impacts to flights because of these low-visibility conditions," she said. "Not all aircraft are able to utilize that ILS on that particular runway."

It is the second day in a row that flights are being canceled or delayed out of the airport due to low visibility.

In the meantime, passengers are asked to check their flight schedules regularly.

"As soon as conditions approve, we'll start to see more activity," Burns said. "Airlines are working to get planes here as soon as it's safe to do so."

___

(c)2021 The Times-Picayune | The New Orleans Advocate

Visit The Times-Picayune | The New Orleans Advocate at www.nola.com

Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.